Only if a man can
guarantee that he will never be hit in a fight, that he can see everything
coming and that he can perfectly avoid all the time - only such a man doesn't
need this training.

You have to check yourself - how you react to contact. Some people teach you
defense, defense, defense. What do you mean, defense- People will hit you no
matter what. You need to know how to react. It's normal.

You start working with limited force. That's why we do pushing practice before
striking practice. You have to learn to be stable, to take a step back with the
leg, not to protrude any part of your body, and so on. It applies very directly
to the real world. Suppose somebody lunges at your midsection with a knife. You
recoil your mid-section to avoid it, which lowers your head and neck. The
attacker then immediately slashes upward and you're done. That's the kind of
stupid response we're working to eliminate.

In the army, they have all kinds of mock single combats, with pugil sticks and
so on. It's good in a way, because it trains the spirit. But you need some
technical knowledge to go with your spirit. Imagine you have a good spirit, but
you face a guy who outweighs you by 100+ pounds. That's when you need both good
spirit and good skills. Otherwise the big guy won't care about your spirit,
he'll just destroy you.

In Systema, we have two primary ways to remove and dissipate strikes - through
breathing and through movement.